anxiety

I made almost 300 cake pops last week. I had help from my teenager. They were for her fundraiser afterall. I managed to make, package and deliver them all in a few days with only one order mistake. I officially hate the smell of cake but I have darn near perfected it and if I wasn’t so sane, I’d have me a little business. I know better though. 300 in one week is enough to make my back throw curse words in my direction for at the very least, 24 hours.

I am however, the local queen of cake pops. Even if I never want to see them again.

I feel very fortunate in that I am really pretty good at a lot of things. I can sew. Well. I have made more costumes than I care to admit. Each one was hand sewn. Davis’ costume last year literally made my fingers bleed. It was wonderful and I will someday get his Daryl Dixon vest signed and framed. Because I love that costume, that kid and that man (hello Norman Reedus, wanna sign my vest?) I have made money for very tight Christmas’ with felt food and I have made many, many babies blankets. I can crochet. Pretty well. I can make a hat, a sweater and even pants now. I don’t always close my rounds just right but I am not embarrassed of my work. I’ve taught myself web work, I consider myself an illustrator and I am not bad behind a camera. I am good at lots of things but I never feel great at anything.

Maybe I am great at cake pops. I don’t know.

It’s really hard to work at things, with your whole heart and not reap what you feel the benefit of the work should be. Shouldn’t I be internet famous by now? Shouldn’t I have people beating down my door for my wares? Nope. That’s not in my cards and I get that but it doesn’t make it an easier pill to swallow.

It’s tough to do the work. Really do the work. And when you really nail it, it’s hard not to reach out for that pat on the back. But if we’re doing it for the pat, we’re just not doing it for the right reasons. That’s an even bigger pill. Damn pills.

We bought a new car last night. It’s older than my oldest child. I wasn’t very happy about the choice but it’s bigger than the other car we looked at and seems like it maybe a good fit. But some highway shaking and tough turning says it may have issues I wasn’t prepared to deal with. I hate cars. I always have. Working for a car lot taught me more than I care to know. And it makes me anxious to know we have an older car that will need care. When we bought the van I added a package that covered all the care throughout the lease. You can’t do that with an old car, bought from a person and so now I think about all the extra costs and work that are paired with a car this age.

But we needed a car and this is the one he wanted. The benefit of it is it is a automatic where the last was a stick. My daughter, learning to drive, has enough on her plate driving in this area.. it would have been killer to then add shifting to the mix. It’s also AWD and has more room then the last car. It will be helpful to have the trunk space for sports gear etc. Also, it’s a Honda and I know if Honda’s are well cared for, it will do it’s job for a long time. I just have to make the effort to take care of it before it goes down that old car slippery slope.

I’m trying to find the positives here. It’s hard.

Hopefully, HOPEFULLY it ends up being a wonderful car. That lasts more than a couple years. Because I hate the car buying process and I just want something to last a lifetime. I know that’s a lot to ask.

Hi! I’m Gail, the voice behind Mimicking Motherhood. I started blogging after the birth of my 2nd child as a way to connect with far away family. Things have definitely changed since then. Now, mama to five, this is a place to help connect with other mothers, who feel like me.I love to make and write all while trying to figure out how to be myself in the world of anxiety and depression. Glad you stopped by.

It’s March 15th and I have taken 166 photos total in 2016. Now I try and remember that this is just from my “big camera” and there are plenty of memories on my phone but we all know what happens to those phone photos.

Nothing. They just sit on your phone.

I started taking photos when the kids were little. But I had always sort of had a bug in my ear about photography. It started with a short stint on the yearbook committee and a dark room that I can still smell like it is in the next room.

But camera gear is expensive. And when Devlynn was born, I relied mostly on my mom to take photos because even though I had a small camera, diapers were more important than film.

I bought my first DSLR with money I earned making a logo. And it took off from there.

There are 100s of thousands of photos in my collection. Until now.

Because I don’t love it anymore.

Depression is a funny thing. It is a thief of joy. To put it mildly. Anxiety coupled with depression? They’re like the Natural Born Killers of joy. Taking you out piece by piece and laughing all along the way. My depression tells me not to bother to take the photos and my anxiety reminds me I am not good enough anyway.

Together they say, “why bother?”

“Why bother” is winning.

Baseball has started. I am hoping it will rekindle that spark I had. I do love sports photos. I can say it’s one of my favorite things to shoot. But after watching all the things my anxiety said I couldn’t do, pass before me… I stopped shooting games too. Because anxiety tells me that I can’t edit like that person and even if I could they wouldn’t hire me anyway. I’m not a man. And I am definitely not one of the boys. And my gear is so old, who am I kidding. Hello again anxiety.

After Davis was born I took medicine for awhile. I can say it helped me not feel sad or anxious but reality was it made it so I just didn’t feel much at all. And I had to decide whether I wanted to be not sad or I wanted to be me and sad sometimes. I picked me but there are weeks and days and hours that I think maybe it was the wrong choice. Because it’s really exhausting to hate everything about yourself. And even more tiring to be sad all the time. I’m tired of being sad.

And I miss being the me the sad is stealing.

I’m just not sure what to pick.

This morning was a rough one. Last night was really the start. I sat trying to turn in an idea to 99Designs but had a baby crawling up my leg, two big kids wrestling loudly and a 4 year old wailing over a 8 hour old boo boo. And I was alone. Baseball practice. And I snapped. And everyone got yelled at because I just wanted 20 minutes to work. Or 20 minutes to watch a show without someone crawling up my legs. But everyone always needs me. And I never get a moment alone. And I don’t have anything that’s “me” because the sewing always waits for laundry and I always come home to insanity. And we’re constantly going and the introvert in me is dying slowly and painfully.

So this morning when Davis pulled his typical sloth game, I snapped at him and when I asked him what was wrong with him, he said he was lazy. Who do you think taught him that? Me. The crushing sound of those words coming out of his mouth. I think I will hear it forever. Hearing “lazy” is different then teasing him about being a sloth. To think you’re lazy? When you’re just a boy learning. Shame on me. Shame on me. Our voices are our kids thoughts. So often I forget that. So very often.

Hopefully he will forgive me and I can tell him he’s not lazy. Because he’s not. He’s 11. And he needs to learn how to be a man. At 11, you still sit on the couch and it’s always someone else’s fault and it’s my job as his parent to teach him… not scold him and make him feel like something he’s not. Because while he’s sort of slothy, he’s always witty and smart and kind and wonderful in so many way. And we’re not all a million miles a minute.

I have to get out of this cloud so I can be a better mother. But I am just not sure what to pick. I can’t let my sad be my kids’ futures. I just keep thinking of the therapy bills. And I can’t figure out how to fix it…

Hi! I’m Gail, the voice behind Mimicking Motherhood. I started blogging after the birth of my 2nd child as a way to connect with far away family. Things have definitely changed since then. Now, mama to five, this is a place to help connect with other mothers, who feel like me.I love to make and write all while trying to figure out how to be myself in the world of anxiety and depression. Glad you stopped by.

I never go to the doctor. Ever. I hate it. I even wait till 12+ weeks when I am pregnant. It’s just not my thing. At all. So this last week when I woke up with chest pain and short breath, you knew I didn’t feel well when I couldn’t get to the doctor’s office fast enough. I thought to myself, “great, I have pneumonia and if I don’t get it treated, they’ll put me in the hospital and my house will fall apart”. And drove me and the babies to the closest urgent care. Yoga pants, bed head and all.

When you go into any kind of medical building and you poorly word how you’re feeling with things like “chest pain” and soreness in you arms followed by trouble breathing, they rush you in for an EKG followed quickly by a chest xray.

I can knock that one off my bucket list.

Now imagine me though, sort of shocked, not feeling well, with my three and one year old, getting an ekg. Also mix in the fact I am still nursing and that you can’t have a underwire bra on with an EKG and you end up with breastmilk, screaming toddlers and pleading to all things holy, just to go home.

I was not having a heart attack. I don’t even have a little bit of fluid in my lungs. It’s just Costochondritis and it’s pretty much nothing. I’m a hypochondriac. You could tell by how the nurses looked at me. Ugh the worst.

My chest still hurts. The doctor said it had lots to do with toting around my monster one year old. I don’t think it helps I still hold Dexter as much as he’ll let me. And age. I guess sometimes you don’t realize how much your body has aged.

All and all it wasn’t that fun and I don’t think I will be so eager to go in again.

Health care is so scary. You worry if you don’t go in, something could be terribly wrong but if you do go in and it’s nothing, I always worry they think I am insane. The anxiety talking I realize. But I still wonder. I often wonder why some of *us* get so wrapped up in what people think about us. And why, when most people stop caring, I still do. Better to get looked at, better safe the sorry, they say but I can’t get past the “what if they think I am crazy”. I almost had Davis in the car because I so doubted myself.

I’ve decided to start the doula program this summer. I can’t however decided whether I should do a certified program or a postpartum program. I worry that if I work with woman before and during labor and delivery, I won’t have the know how to teach them to trust their own bodies. I couldn’t ever trust mine. I think my poor husband was ready to deliver our babies in the bathroom because I was so hesitant to call and “bother” anyone. I don’t ever want my mothers to feel like that. But if I couldn’t learn to trust myself, how do I teach them? And I really want to work in the birth arts. I really want to help women and families have the births they want. Especially having seen bother my sister and sister in laws wonky hospital deliveries. But will I be good enough?

I have also waffled with the idea of working as a postpartum doula but focusing special attention on mama’s who’ve lost their little ones. I think there is perhaps a special needs for care in that field. To have a “friend” who knows what to say and how to help. To be there as a physical and emotional support. I’ve only done a little research on it but found little. And as strange as people may find it, I have always had a calling to work with those with loss. It takes all kinds, all hearts and mine is with those mamas.

Making these big leaps is hard for me. I fear failing because I feel like I’ve failed at everything. And I just want to do good… I just don’t know where to start.

Hi! I’m Gail, the voice behind Mimicking Motherhood. I started blogging after the birth of my 2nd child as a way to connect with far away family. Things have definitely changed since then. Now, mama to five, this is a place to help connect with other mothers, who feel like me.I love to make and write all while trying to figure out how to be myself in the world of anxiety and depression. Glad you stopped by.